WASHINGTON — The Senate rejected the scientific consensus
that humans are causing climate change, days after NASA and the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared 2014 the hottest year
ever recorded on Earth.

The Republican-controlled Senate defeated a measure Wednesday stating
that climate change is real and that human activity significantly
contributes to it. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, offered the measure as
the Senate debated the Keystone XL pipeline, which would tap the
carbon-intensive oil sands in the Canadian province of Alberta.

The Senate voted 50-49 on the measure, which required 60 votes in order to pass.

“Only in the halls of Congress is this a controversial piece of legislation,” Schatz said.

The chairman of the environment committee, Sen. James Inhofe,
R-Okla., is an enthusiastic denier of climate change, saying it is the
“biggest hoax” perpetrated against mankind.

“The hoax is there are some people so arrogant to think they are so
powerful they can change the climate,” Inhofe said Wednesday on the
Senate floor. “Man can’t change the climate.”

The Senate, with Inhofe’s support, did pass a separate measure saying
that climate change is real — just not that human activity is a cause.
Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., was the only senator to vote against it.

The Democrats pushed for the climate change votes as an attempt to
get Republicans on the record in advance of the 2016 elections, with
polls showing that a majority of Americans believe humans are causing
global warming. The votes were offered as non-binding amendments to the
bill authorizing construction of Keystone.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, urged her colleagues to vote against
the finding that climate change is significantly caused by humans.

Murkowski, chairwoman of the energy committee, has expressed worries
about the impact of climate change on her state. But she said on the
Senate floor that the fact the measure included the word “significantly”
was enough to merit voting against it.

Some Republican senators, including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
of Kentucky, have dodged the issue of whether humans are causing climate
change, often using the talking point that “I’m not a scientist.”

President Barack Obama mocked the “I’m not a scientist” line in his State of the Union speech on Tuesday night.

“Well, I’m not a scientist, either. But you know what? I know a lot
of really good scientists at NASA, and NOAA, and at our major
universities,” Obama said.

Scientists from NASA and NOAA announced last week that 2014 was the
hottest year on record, continuing a warming trend that the scientists
attributed to greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels.

Just five Republicans, including Sen. Lindsey Graham of South
Carolina, joined the Democrats on Wednesday in voting for the finding
that human activity significantly contributes to climate change.

Graham said he’s not a scientist, but that he has heard enough from scientists on the issue to be convinced.

He rejected Democratic arguments that approving the Keystone XL
pipeline would worsen climate change, though, maintaining that the
Canadian oil sands are going to be developed even if the pipeline is not
built.